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A nice set with a decent amount of blocks

My little girl is a huge fan of Duplo in the past few months it has been her favourite thing to play with. She calls it her 'build', she is also a fan of her tea set and loves to make us tea so when this was recommended to me on Amazon I knew it would be perfect for her 2nd Birthday.

The box is aimed at children 2-5 years old. Another reason I like this box is that it came with a decent amount of bricks 55 to be exact which is a lot more than what you get in other boxes for the same price.

As with all Duplo blocks they are compatible with Lego so if you have an older child or when your child gets older they will fit together.

When I viewed this online I thought the box would be reusable, however it is just a cardboard box with a plastic lid. I did reuse it a few times however my daughter like most toddlers has bashed it around a fair bit and it has now had to go in the recycling bin. The lid however has been kept as it doubles up as a cake tray.

Inside the box you get a selection of normal shaped Duplo box but in colours such as mint green, brown and pink, you also get meringues, cake cases, blocks that look like the top of cakes, flowers and finally 3 candles. The blocks are the perfect size for little hands and are easy to put together and take apart.

When my daughter opened this on her birthday last week she immediately got stuck in, we made several different cakes ranging from cupcakes to slices of cake in all different colours. We also stuck the candles on the cakes and sung Happy Birthday while my daughter pretended to blow the candles out. We were all then served slices of cake by her on the tray along with a cup of tea. She has also built big towers with the blocks and added them to other sets she already has.

The great thing about this set is that it has massively grown out collection of Duplo. It is a great toy that encourages creativity as the possibilities are endless, there are so many different types of cakes that can be created.

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A lovely Duplo set for little girls who like building their own tea parties

Duplo is a big favourite in my house. Most of what we have has been passed down from my childrens' older male cousins so we have an assortment of traditional blocks, animals, Bob the Builder sets, train tracks and other vehicles. However, there are now some new sets on the market which are specifically targeting the pre-school girl market and, with a two year old girl in the house, a few of these sets are now slipping into our collection. My daughter received the Duplo 6785 Creative Cakes set as a second birthday present.

* The Product *Duplo 6785 Creative Cakes comes in a big cardboard box with a pink plastic lid. The lid doubles as a tray for serving / displaying the cakes created with the Duplo pieces. The set is a mix of traditional Duplo blocks in cake-related colours - chocolate brown, mint green, lemon yellow and a couple of shades of pink - and specific cake-style blocks. The 'cake blocks' include pink swirly frosting, two brown 'cupcake case' blocks, three rounded blocks designed to look like the top of a cupcake and two sets of four wedge shape base blocks which can be fixed together to make round plates or cake bases. The set also contains three candles and some different coloured flowers for decorating your culinary creations. In total there are 55 pieces of Lego in this set, which I feel provides plenty of opportunity for creative play, although I would prefer it to have a couple more cupcake cases and toppers as I think those are the most instantly recognisable cakes for younger children.

* Playability *In my opinion, this is a Duplo set which genuinely encourages more creative and imaginative play. My children tend to use this set more as an additional accessory to the toy kitchen than a Duplo set - they will busy themselves creating beautiful trays of cakes and then bring them to us to 'eat', usually with a cup of tea (or a glass of imaginary wine) as an accompaniment. We do have other cakes for the play kitchen include wooden cupcakes and a large plastic birthday cake with candles, but they seem to genuinely enjoy the act of creating their own individual cakes with this set. My daughter also makes cakes with this set when she sets up picnics on the kitchen floor with her dolls and soft toys. The box lid / tray also helps with this type of imaginative role play as it enables them to carry and serve their creations easily.

I feel that this set gives a lot of different options in terms of what you can build. I've noticed that my two year old prefers to make small cakes - she uses the cupcake cases and toppers a lot, and then decorates them with either a flower or a candle, or puts a couple of different coloured blocks together to create a small cake. My five year old, despite the overwhelming pinkness of the set (usually something that would put him off using it) likes to design the kind of culinary masterpieces which wouldn't look out of place on The Great British Bake-Off with multiple layers and meringue swirls. Or, alternatively, you could just integrate the set into a larger collection of Duplo if you find that your children don't really get into the whole cake creating idea.

In addition to this imaginative play opportunities, this set also enhances childrens' fine motor skills by encouraging them to put the blocks together, can help with the identification of different shapes and colours and enables them to think in a more constructive way.

* Cost *Duplo 6785 Creative Cakes has an RRP of £19.99. I think this represents pretty good value for money as you do get a reasonable amount of blocks in the set and it is different from other Duplo sets on the market. As mentioned above, it also has additional playability as a toy kitchen / tea party accessory which I think adds to its value.

* Would I Recommend It? *I would definitely recommend this Creative Cakes set as a lovely present for little girls in the 2-4 year old age range. In my opinion, it works just as well as a standalone toy in its own right as it does as part of a larger Duplo collection. It encourages creative construction and imaginative play, assists in the development of fine motor skills which is so important amongst this particular age group and can also be used as an educational resource to help teach shapes and colours (or even the different between a large cake, a cupcake and a meringue - another important life skill!) My daughter loves this set and has played with it regularly in the eight months since she got it, and I can see it getting even more play in the future.